I Miss Amadeus Cho

While reorganizing some comic boxes from the move — I should copy and paste that phrase to use over the next two years — KC found a good memory for me. Amazing Fantasy (Volume 2) #15 was cover-dated January 2006. According to the text page in the back, it was created to “revisit, revamp, or recreate… idle Marvel character names.”

The lead story in the anthology was the introduction of Amadeus Cho, by Greg Pak and Takeshi Miyazawa. Given the editor’s comments, I wondered if this was a reuse, but according to the character’s Wikipedia bio, it’s not. That’s good, because I like the idea of Amadeus being totally original.

I admire Pak for being willing to take on a super-smart character. It’s hard to write more intelligent than normal (just like, judging from current superhero comics, it’s hard to write nicer or more moral than you are). That’s one of the reasons I loved Cho — he was different and creative and someone I wanted to see more of. He was also a nice contrast to the more physically powerful characters, and he brought some needed diversity to the Marvel universe. And he had a cute dog (actually a coyote called Kirby).

Cho was used on the titles Pak moved through, supporting the Hulk and Hercules, but there’s not a lot of shelf space or audience attention for quirky books like those these days. At least no one’s killed him off yet.

I also miss the art of Miyazawa. He draws terrific young people with strong feeling. Seems he’s moved to Japan to work in manga.